I saw a bit of an article online today about elaborate prom invitations, called Prom-posals. I first noticed this trend back on MTV’s hit TV series Laguna Beach and now it seems to be sweeping the nation. One young man got down on one knee to ask his prom date out in front of an audience of 250 after their final performance in the high school play. And scene!
Real talk: I asked my junior prom date out at his locker after our pre-Calc class. His response, “I guess.” And that was that. We spoke about our joint attendance of the prom probably twice; one time prompted by his mom, who was wondering what flowers she should buy; the second time, about how we would get there. I don’t think either of us had a driver’s license at that point. The flowers looked great in the pictures, which is more than I can say for my prom date, who looked like a deer in headlights in every single picture from the event. But that was probably good for me because it gave me the appearance of being the ‘cooler’ member of the pair, which, if you knew me in high school (and continue to know me today), is a pretty miraculous feat.
Maybe a guy that asks you to prom on a banner pulled by an airplane is more romantic than a guy who responds to you asking him to prom the same way he might respond to someone asking him if he wanted extra cheese on his pizza or if he liked t-shirts. But it doesn’t take an elaborate prom-posal, or an expensive dress, or a stretch Hummer to make a high school dance fun. I have great memories from my junior prom, chief among them the sense of pride I have in my 16-year-old self for asking out the cutest guy in her pre-Calc class. Admittedly, this is not saying much given the pre-Calc taking, 16-year-old boy pool at the time, but still.
I fear that these elaborate invitations are only setting young women up for disappointment in real life. No one is going to hire a plane to ask you on a date. Sure, you’ll read the invitation, but it will be via text and probably involve a lot of stupid abbreviations, spelling mistakes (both intentional and unintentional), and abominable grammar. In my experience, a guy that picks both a specific time and a specific place to go out with you is a standout.
So ladies, if you’re theater-loving prom date plans an elaborate prom-posal, enjoy it while you can. I think my man Robert Frost put it best:
Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
Monday, April 23, 2012
Thursday, April 12, 2012
Sidewalk Talk
Dog poop. Let’s talk about it.
I’m not a dog owner but consider myself a dog lover. I don’t have the disposable income or the sense of responsibility necessary to be a good pet owner. I know this. However, I like to think that were I one day to own a pet, I’d be a conscientious pet owner. And so I have a bone to pick with non-conscientious pet owners, specifically, those that don’t pick up after their dogs.
I’ve spoken of it before. I recognize that picking up your dog’s poop is a gross chore. There’s a reason why someone invented the toilet and that we humans don’t just poop on the floor, grab it with a plastic grocery bag, and then throw it in the trashcan. That’s disgusting.
While I can understand why people wouldn’t want to pick up after their dogs, I still find it detestable when they don’t own up to their responsibility. Recently I’ve started to notice a particularly concerning trend in dog doo cleanup practices: abandoned poop baggies on the sidewalk.
More and more, I’ve been encountering plastic bags of poop left lying on the sidewalk, seemingly in the exact spot where the dog deposited the poop initially. Why? Why did you do that, dog owner? To my mind, once you’ve bagged the poop, the most odious part of the task, palming the poop and putting it in a bag, is complete. So I don’t understand how it was too gross for you, the dog owner, to then walk with the bag of poop a block until you found a trash can. Chances are, at one point in his life, your dog has licked his own private parts and then immediately licked you. That’s also gross but you seem to deal with it. Yet this is where you draw the line; holding onto a bag of your dog’s poop for a few blocks? Seems to me that if you’re going to leave the poop bag there, there’s really no reason to even go through the effort of bagging it. It’s like horrible smelling cabs that have air fresheners, except the air fresheners also smell horrible. Why bother?
I don’t think what I expect of dog owners is extreme. I once saw a woman intercepting her dog's poop before it hit the ground. She had her plastic bag in hand hovering below her dog’s butt to catch the poop as it came out. Absolutely disgusting. I don’t expect that level of attention. In fact, I don’t trust that level of commitment to a dog.
But I do expect dog owners to pick up their dog’s poop and then deposit that picked up poop in a trash can somewhere. Is that so much to ask?
I’m not a dog owner but consider myself a dog lover. I don’t have the disposable income or the sense of responsibility necessary to be a good pet owner. I know this. However, I like to think that were I one day to own a pet, I’d be a conscientious pet owner. And so I have a bone to pick with non-conscientious pet owners, specifically, those that don’t pick up after their dogs.
I’ve spoken of it before. I recognize that picking up your dog’s poop is a gross chore. There’s a reason why someone invented the toilet and that we humans don’t just poop on the floor, grab it with a plastic grocery bag, and then throw it in the trashcan. That’s disgusting.
While I can understand why people wouldn’t want to pick up after their dogs, I still find it detestable when they don’t own up to their responsibility. Recently I’ve started to notice a particularly concerning trend in dog doo cleanup practices: abandoned poop baggies on the sidewalk.
More and more, I’ve been encountering plastic bags of poop left lying on the sidewalk, seemingly in the exact spot where the dog deposited the poop initially. Why? Why did you do that, dog owner? To my mind, once you’ve bagged the poop, the most odious part of the task, palming the poop and putting it in a bag, is complete. So I don’t understand how it was too gross for you, the dog owner, to then walk with the bag of poop a block until you found a trash can. Chances are, at one point in his life, your dog has licked his own private parts and then immediately licked you. That’s also gross but you seem to deal with it. Yet this is where you draw the line; holding onto a bag of your dog’s poop for a few blocks? Seems to me that if you’re going to leave the poop bag there, there’s really no reason to even go through the effort of bagging it. It’s like horrible smelling cabs that have air fresheners, except the air fresheners also smell horrible. Why bother?
I don’t think what I expect of dog owners is extreme. I once saw a woman intercepting her dog's poop before it hit the ground. She had her plastic bag in hand hovering below her dog’s butt to catch the poop as it came out. Absolutely disgusting. I don’t expect that level of attention. In fact, I don’t trust that level of commitment to a dog.
But I do expect dog owners to pick up their dog’s poop and then deposit that picked up poop in a trash can somewhere. Is that so much to ask?
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